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The Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST) was set up in 1989 to provide members of both Houses of Parliament with objective information on scientific and technological issues. In this paper, the concept of ‘technology assessment’ is explained, together with details of POST's formation and mode of working. Finally, two recent papers from POST on The Relationships between Defence and Civil Science and Technology, and on High‐performance Computing, will be briefly discussed.

The late Harry Weslake, the founder of Weslake Limited was born in Exeter in 1897. Whilst still in his early teens he became fascinated by combustion engine carburettors and registered several pioneering patents covering carburettors jointly with his father (he was too young to register them on his own). By the early 1920's he had founded his own company. His twin diffuser carburettor named the Wex (for Weslake‐Exeter) was being widely used at this time by the motor cycle trials and car racing fraternity at Brooklands and elsewhere. This involvement with racing continued for fifty years. The name Weslake becoming a by‐word in motor racing circles.

Environmental pollution has increased as a result of modern settlements' expanding demand and rapid population growth. In Ebonyi State, Nigeria, quarrying is one of the activities that has an impact on the environment and ecosystem. The aim of the study is to assess stream water’s quality in order to ascertain how quarry operations affect the streams’ water quality. The present study investigated the environmental impact of quarrying on the physicochemical properties of surface water in Ebonyi State, Nigeria.

A total of 288 surface water samples were taken in 2018, 2019 and 2020 from quarry locations and a Control location for the determination of physicochemical properties and heavy metal contents using standard analytical methods. Datasets were analysed using Fisher’s significance least difference (F-LSD) at the 0.05 probability level.

This study discovered that surface waters around quarries are severely polluted, according to the results of the physico-chemical and heavy metal contents of the surface waters. Most of the physical and chemical properties of the water downstream of the Ishiagu, Umuoghara and Ngbo did not meet World Health Organisation (WHO) standards, such as colour and pH. The heavy metal levels in the Ishiagu, Umuoghara and Ngbo streams were above WHO criteria for Pb, Cd and Fe. The results point to the obvious conclusion, without prejudice to other unexplained factors that the pollution is most likely the result of quarry contamination. Strict measures should be taken to regularly monitor the water quality of the streams.

This study focused on the assessment of physicochemical properties using standard analytical methods to evaluate the environmental impact of quarrying on surface water qualities. The study used the World Health Organisation (WHO, 2011) water guideline as a standard to compare with the study dataset and control measures.

The aim of this chapter is to show the limits of the European policy model and to support the existence, through straightforward empirical analysis, of an inverse relationship both in the short run and in the long run between trust in institutions and unemployment. The empirical methodology relies on dynamic panel data techniques allowing measuring in a single equation both the long-run relationship and the short-run speed of adjustment among variables. This connection appears to be valid both in the Eurozone considered as a whole and in particular in peripheral countries, where the macroeconomic dynamics have been, under this respect, much more divergent from the average. This outcome allows proofing that to consolidate the European process of integration in the long run, institutions should have as main objective not only inflation but especially unemployment.

The Report of the Royal College of Physicians (London) and the British Cardiac Society issued in April last was the product of a joint working party, whose aim was to formulate the best possible advice which can at present be given to medical practitioners towards the prevention of coronary heart disease. It caused quite a stir, particularly its dietary recommendations, and the mass media made the most of it, more from inferences drawn from the measures recommended than from the report itself. Now that the sensation of it has gone and the dust has begun to settle, we can see the Report contains nothing that is new; it tells us what we have long known. Like the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, except that there are three of them, at least for the moment, the causative factors of the rising incidence of coronary heart disease, built into our affluent society, have been working their way at the heart of man for a good many years now.

Cyber threats present constantly evolving and unique challenges to national security professionals at all levels of government. Public and private sector entities also face a constant stream of cyberattacks through varied methods by actors with myriad motivations. These threats are not expected to diminish in the near future. As a result, homeland security and national security professionals at all levels of government must understand the unique motivations and capabilities of malicious cyber actors in order to better protect against and respond to cyberattacks. This chapter outlines the most common cyberattacks; explains the motivations behind these attacks; and describes the federal, state, and local efforts to address these threats.

The aim of this study is to determine the variation of the different oil analysis instruments in terms of standard deviation and CV‐values, when measuring samples of fully formulated hydraulic and gear oils taken from working systems.

In this investigation, two different spectrometric techniques, inductively coupled plasma‐optical emission spectrometers (ICP‐OES) and rotating disk electrode‐optical emission spectrometers (RDE‐OES), have been studied to determine the instruments' precision of measurement and ability to measure the absolute level of contamination. The study was based on a series of measurements using artificial contamination mixed with oil.

The ICP has better precision of measurement of the two instruments, but cannot predict the absolute values of contamination when oil samples are only treated by organic solvent dilution if the samples include large or dense particles. It is therefore not too good, with the sample pre‐treatment method used, at detecting wear processes that produce dense/large particles, such as pitting failure. For instance, microwave‐assisted acid digestion could be used for sample pre‐treating to obtain accurate results in that case. It should, however, be able to detect wear mechanisms that produce small particles such as abrasive wear in any case. The ICP has a repeatability value of r=3 percent and a reproducibility value of R=12 percent for contamination levels of between 50 and 400 ppm and r=0.6  and R=2 ppm, respectively, at values below 50 ppm. The RDE cannot predict the absolute value of contamination if this includes large or dense particles if proper sample pre‐treatment is not used. It is therefore not good at detecting wear mechanisms that produces dense/large particles (if the oil samples are not pre‐treated properly) such as pitting but should be able to detect abrasive wear and similar processes that produce small particles in any case. The RDE's precision of measurement is not as good as the ICP, with a reproducibility variation of R=r=25 percent for contamination levels between 20 and 500 ppm and R=r=6 ppm for contamination level below 20 ppm.

Only the effects from lubricating oils are studied.

This study will significantly increase the industrial knowledge concerning measurement precision in particle contamination measurement systems.

No similar study is found.

In his review of 30 years of research in Prospect Theory, Barberis (2013) notes that support for Prospect Theory had come mainly from the laboratory. In this paper, I write about a recurring phenomenon in real life that is consistent with Prospect Theory predictions in decision-making loss domain. The 60 cases noted in this paper are associated with specific risk seekers that had cost more than $140 billion (an average of $2.33 billion per case). Given space consider– ations, I provide synopses for 14 cases. A few of these cases have been discussed in the extant literature in connection with internal control, but were not considered from the perspective of Prospect Theory. It is striking that these cases are costly, all participants are young men, and almost all had followed the gambler’s martingale strategy – i.e., double down. While these cases are informative about risk-seeking behavior, they are not sufficiently systematic to be subjected to stylized archival research methods.

Dementia in older persons with learning disabilities is a growing concern for all those involved in their care. There is at present no effective treatment, but the importance of current drug treatments is reviewed. Developments in drug treatments for dementia remain an active area of ongoing research.